emotions and rocks

this morning's bench was out at fort williams

although i don't know if it's medically accurate, i feel like i breathe better by the ocean, listening to the waves

and maybe that's an ingrained reaction to a practice a friend suggested decades ago as a practice for dealing with extremes

it involved going to fort williams when i was __________ (fill in the blank with an emotion that doesn't serve me well but i still need to experience it)

that blank for me has been anxious, insecure, neurotic, consumed with guilt, shame, remorse, regret, ...

her suggestion was to pick up a rock and imagine that emotion going into the rock, throwing the rock into ocean and then picking up a smaller, lighter rock and imagining the opposite of that emotion going into that rock

then bringing that rock home.

i've done this THOUSANDS of times since i first tried it an it worked

it's taught me a few things:

1. to find a place to put that extreme raw emotion and give it to something way more powerful than myself

2. enrich that experience with a visual object to extend the moment of relief and nourishment that happens

3. years after the fact, I still have rocks in my home, accumulated one at a time remind me that i have tools

i once shared this once with a group of friends and found out from a police officer that was there that taking rocks from fort williams is actually against the law :-|

i may ... or may not ... have another rock for my collection.

grateful.